


Assistance

by seamen_demon



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-09-15
Updated: 2004-09-15
Packaged: 2019-05-31 19:45:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15126596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seamen_demon/pseuds/seamen_demon
Summary: Josh deals (or doesn't deal) with Donna's permanent absence.





	Assistance

**Author's Note:**

> A copy of this work was once archived at National Library, a part of the [ West Wing Fanfiction Central](https://fanlore.org/wiki/West_Wing_Fanfiction_Central), a West Wing fanfiction archive. More information about the Open Doors approved archive move can be found in the [announcement post](http://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/8325).

Author: caru  
Title: Assistance  
Character: Josh.  
Category: Angst.  
Pairing: Josh/Donna  
Rating: YTEEN  
Summary: Josh deals (or doesn’t deal) with Donna’s permanent absence.  
Author's Notes: Spoilers up to MD. This is pretty short with a character death and not a happy ending.

**1.**

They cleaned out her desk today.

His assistant’s name is Jamie and she smells like maple trees. He tries to remember her name but she’s the fourth one in as many weeks so he fails to see the point anymore. Sarah becomes Karen, Karen is Jennifer, Jennifer is Jamie. Jamie is a fading apparition, a blob of smeared black ink that holds dates and numbers and names but too soon she’s transformed into someone else and he stops worrying about these things all together.

They start to think maybe a male assistant will be better.

His name turns out to be Kevin and he manages to last twice as long as the other four.

But returning from the Oval with Leo by his side, the desk is empty one night. It only occurs to Leo then that he should’ve told him first.

“Five assistants in two months, Josh.” is his only reason. “Maybe you should take some time off…”

He starts to call Donna, because Donna is the one with all the answers in these types of situations when Josh doesn’t know whether to turn right or left. When he’s already mid-step but forgotten what his destination was. The name tumbles from his lips, disintegrating in the air, and Leo looks at him with something like sadness.

**2.**

2 AM flicks into 2:01. 2:01 to 2:02. He stares at the brightly lit numbers until his vision blurs and he eventually finds sleep.

Sometimes he wakes in the middle of the night with an answer. He’ll scribble it in the dark on notebook paper because he knows by morning he’ll have forgotten it. He likes writing in the dark. Starts to believe he can do everything in the dark now, closes his eyes and pretends to be blind. Multiple bruises on his shins from the coffee table and later he decides to keep the lights on more often.

The woman in his bed has blonde hair and it’s sprayed across the pillow next to him. He doesn’t really know why he does this, maybe because he has nothing else to do, maybe because Leo said he needed time off and he had taken it. Eventually he decides it’s because he’s an asshole. Because she has cherry red lips and nails that dug tiny crescent moons in his back, because she’ll leave before dawn and he’ll never have to speak to her again.

**3.**

CJ asks how he’s doing. He wants to say things like

“I can’t sleep”

“I have nightmares”

“I dreamt about Donna and she talked about home. I can’t remember what she said but it seems really important now”

Instead he says “fine” but he thinks CJ heard it all, anyway.

She reaches out with a hand and wraps it around his, squeezes just a little, her smile broken and hopeless but all he can watch is her clear nails against the top of his hand, catching a glint of light. Her voice is quiet, struggling not to get lost in the air between her mouth and his ears.

“I miss her.” but he’s not listening.

After 3 weeks he stops dreaming. It feels worse than the dreams, it feels like letting her go.

They cleaned out her desk, and he can’t stop thinking of home.

**4.**

He counts the bubbles in his drink. It’s been five months but it feels like longer. Everyone can smile now and he starts to believe he’s forgotten how.

He tries to imagine his heart stopping on an operating table. He wonders if maybe it had and nobody thought to tell him.

The next day he tells Leo “I’m resigning”,

and nobody seems surprised.


End file.
